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Florida fired coach Dan Mullen on Sunday after the Gators fell to 2-6 in SEC play, their worst conference winning percentage in a season since 1979. The program announced it was parting ways with Mullen and running backs coach Greg Knox will serve as the Gators interim coach. A press conference with Florida athletic director Scott Stricklin is scheduled for 3 p.m. ET.
It was a dramatic fall for Mullen, who led Florida to the SEC Championship Game and a third straight New Year’s Six bowl appearance last season. However, the Gators have lost four straight games against FBS opponents and are 2-9 against Power Five teams dating back to the final three games of the 2020 season. Florida nearly upset then-No. 1 Alabama in The Swamp back in September but has consecutively lost at Kentucky, at LSU, at South Carolina and at Missouri with a tough 34-7 defeat in the annual Florida-Georgia game. The Gators’ lone win since early October came 70-52 against Samford, a game in which Florida allowed a program-record 42 points in the first half … to an at-the-time 4-5 FCS team.
Mullen rode plenty of hype into Florida when he took over in 2018. He had led Mississippi State to its best stretch in program history from 2009-17 with the Bulldogs going 69-49 with eight straight bowl appearances. Mullen was also a “coming home” hire as the Gators’ star offensive coordinator under coach Urban Meyer who led a transcendent offense that helped win the program’s last two national championships in 2006 and 2008.
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